


Doctors Aren't Quite the Worst Patients

by Lady_Ganesh



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Community: hc_bingo, Gen, Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-13
Updated: 2011-07-13
Packaged: 2017-10-21 10:01:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 640
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/223947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lady_Ganesh/pseuds/Lady_Ganesh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Food poisoning isn't fun for anyone. (There are no explicit descriptions of the symptoms in the fic!) Thanks to <span><a href="http://emungere.dreamwidth.org/profile"><img/></a><a href="http://emungere.dreamwidth.org/"><b>emungere</b></a></span> for betaing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Doctors Aren't Quite the Worst Patients

"How's the patient?" Sarah asked. She was pretty when she smiled, even when the smile was tinged with a sentiment John could only describe as _I'm so glad I'm not you._

"Don't ask," John said, taking the bag in her arms with gratitude. "Thanks so much for bringing this round, I really appreciate it."

"It's no trouble," Sarah said. "As long as you don't ask _me_ to look after him--"

"I wouldn't wish that on anyone," John said. "Especially you."

"You're a good man," she said, and her smile grew less sadistic and more promising. He leaned in and kissed her, and that was better yet.

And then he heard Sherlock's voice.

"John," wheedling, hoarse, un- _Sherlock_ -like in countless ways. (Except, of course, for the very Sherlock-like demand in his tone.) "John, are you there?"

John rolled his eyes. Sarah tried not to giggle. "It doesn't even sound like him!"

"He's a wreck," John confessed. "The only one suffering more than me is him."

He heard Sherlock's heavy step behind him. "I heard that," Sherlock sniffed.

"I'll be right there," John called back behind him. "Get back in bed."

"I'm tired of bed," Sherlock whined, as John gave Sarah an extra kiss for goodbye.

"You're exhausted," John said, turning back to the stairs as Sarah whispered "good luck." "Sarah's picked up some yoghurt, you can eat a little now you've recovered a bit."

Sherlock whinged and collapsed dramatically on the sofa. He'd carried a blanket out of his room, and looked like an overgrown, lanky child. A day of illness had made him look even paler and thinner than normal. "Yoghurt."

"You need to restore your fluid balance. You always tell me how easy my job is, surely you remember that much." He took Sarah's bag up to the kitchen and started unpacking it. Two large containers of yoghurt, today's _Guardian,_ a few magazines, and a tiny, wrapped box for John, with a Post-It note that read, "for my favourite Doctor."

John smiled to himself, and pulled at the paper.

"It's chocolate," Sherlock said. "For God's sake, don't open it yet, it'll make me ill again."

"You're such a child when you're sick," John said, putting the box down and opening up the first container of yoghurt.

"Easy for you to say, you haven't spent the last two days vomiting."

Fair enough, but John _had_ spent the last days looking after a miserable, vomiting flatmate who elevated self-pity into something of an art form. At least he hadn't been bored enough to shoot the walls or set anything afire.

"Are you sure I should be eating yoghurt?"

"It's certainly safer than the things you'd been keeping in the fridge," John said. "I'm not going to leave you on holiday again without cleaning it." There'd been something with a half-inch crust of green scum on it, which was almost certainly not what Sherlock had eaten; John had binned half the fridge's containers anyway, including some pale, greyish shrimp and dingy lettuce that were the most likely culprits. John handed Sherlock the _Guardian,_ the yoghurt, and a spoon.

"Fine." Sherlock dropped into his chair and flipped the paper open.

John was washing out his morning's dishes when Sherlock cried, "Ah- _ha!"_

"What?"

"Look." Sherlock walked over to the sink, waggling the newspaper. He had an alarming amount of energy for a man in his condition. "Look at this! _Look at this!"_

"It's the paper," John said, "what--"

 _E. coli outbreak prompts recall of Spanish carrots_

"It had _nothing to do_ with my housekeeping skills," Sherlock said.

"What housekeeping skills?" John muttered, but Sherlock continued:

"Look, the outbreak's over half the European Union.” He grinned in triumph.

"Just eat your yoghurt," John said. At least Sherlock would recover sooner, now he'd once again found the healing balm of being in the right.


End file.
